Strategic Triangles: US-China-India Cyclical Powerplay

Abstract

Washington secured Delhi’s subordination to its early-Cold War strategic interests before India’s independence. From July 1947 to July 1971, when President Richard Nixon upended America’s China policy, India was a US-client, providing base facilities for US military-intelligence sorties against the PRC, spearheading US covert campaigns undermining Beijing’s authority in Tibet, triggering a border war in 1962, and a searing defeat for Delhi (Ali S. Cold War in the High Himalayas. St. Martin’s Press, New York, pp 8–196, 1999) Following China’s 1964 nuclear test, Indian and CIA personnel installed plutonium-powered surveillance devices atop the Himalayas to monitor Chinese nuclear-and-missile tests (Ali 1999, pp 1–3). Tacit-alliance notwithstanding, India often challenged US expectations. After Washington identified China as ‘a constant competitor’ and Congress legislated to counteract the ‘China challenge’ in 1999, Bill Clinton revived the Indo-US anti-Chinese front. Since then, US-Indian military, maritime, nuclear, intelligence and diplomatic cooperation reflected renewed counter-China drives, explaining America’s expanded Indo-Pacific focus. This chapter reviews the uneven evolution of the triangular dynamics, especially even when Indo-US security interests apparently converged.